GREENE COUNTY FIRST TOWNS
Beulah: See Snoddy/Beulah.
Boligee (1816): Col. John McKee
(1771-1833) the Indian Agent, frontier Statesman and local
Congressman, built the first house in this town, Hill of Howth,
in 1816. In 1825, Col George Hays encouraged settlers from VA, NC
and SC to join a new planters’ culture in this new township.
The Bethsalem Presbyterian Church was built on land donated by
Col. Hays in 1835. The church cemetery is the resting place of
many County notables, including Col. McKee and Revolutionary War
Soldier, Mordecai, Barbour of VA. The Friendship Baptist Church
came to Boligee from the Forkland Burton Plantation. St.
Mark’s Episcopal Church was also moved in 1880.
Clinton (about 1819): Clinton began as a community of
wealthy planters and small farmers with fine artesian wells along
the Montgomery to Aberdeen stagecoach route. In 1855-1856 Clinton had 250
residents, two
hotels, four dry-goods stores, one grocery and one drug store, one saddlery, two churches,
two schools and one Masonic Lodge and one Odd Fellows Lodge. Its stately homes and mansions included the Pippen
and Carpenter Plantations, which are now registered as State Landmarks. A fire in
1904 destroyed its business section, but some old churches
remain, including the Concord Church (Clinton) and the Ebenezer
Presbyterian Church. Clinton is about ten miles west of Eutaw on
highway 14.
Dollarhide: This is a great tract of
swamp land 10 miles South of Eutaw, fronting more than 9 miles of
the Warrior River. It has been a haven for sportsmen for
generations, where they built lodges to enjoy the hunting and
fishing.
Erie (1819): Erie, the first county seat for Greene County (now Hale
County) was located
“on the east bank of Tuskaloosa river in Range 2 East, Township 20” is now gone.
One tale associated with the demise of Erie was that “yellow fever swept through the
town and entire households were wiped out.” Another was that Erie was not
located centrally and had then "little and bad water and a muddy location." The county seat was transferred to Eutaw in 1838.
Surnames of early land owners in Erie included: Ashford, Baldwin, Bennett, Brishan, Carr,
Cassells, Childress, Foster, Fowler, Hargrove, Herndon, Gaines, Hines, Inge, Jennings,
Kinnard, Kirksey, Lawson, Loe, Madison, May, Marr, McAlpine, McGee, Monett, Murphy, Myers,
Patterson, Pay, Snedecor, Sheet, Skinner, Robinson, Russell, Sims, Thompson, Thorpe, Wade,
Whitson, Williams, Withers and Wynne.
Eutaw (1838): This became the County
Seat in 1838, moving from the old one, Erie. It was named for the
Revolutionary War Battle of Eutaw Springs (SC) and was laid out
by Robert G. Quarles in 1839 and incorporated as a city in
1841. Of the 53 remaining antebellum homes, 27 are on the National
Register of Historic Places. Barges still dock there on the
Warrior River.
Forkland (1818): This community was
named for its location in the rich farmland in the fork of the
Warrior and Tombigbee Rivers. Settled in 1818, by 1856 it had a
school, churches, stores and a wagon factory. It was an easy
steamboat ride to Mobile. A stagecoach inn remains near the
historic St. John’s in-the-Prairie Episcopal Church as does
the one room school house "Little Place."
Garrett’s Shop: See Tishabee.
Hopewell: See West Greene.
Lewiston: This town was founded by farmers and merchants and included the families named
Carpenter, Eatman, Gandy, Hales, Harris, Hollingsworth, Jones, King, Leavelle,
Morgan, Morrow, Price, Richardson, Sanders, Scarbrough and others associated
with the Pleasant Hill Cumberland Presbyterian Church and cemetery.
Lizzieville: Located 3 miles Northwest
of Boligee on the Clinton Road was a Plantation named
Lizzieville, named for its mistress, Elizabeth Dunlap McLemore,
wife of Joel McLemore. Long before it was destroyed by fire in
1920, it had the only cotton gin in the area and a post office,
tannery, sawmill, store and smokehouse.
Mantua (1817): Settlers form
Spartanburg, SC came to Mantua in 1817 with William N. Morrow.
The pre-1846 Morrow-Eatman House has been the home for 5
generations of the C. Irvin Eatman family. Mantua was part of
Pickens County in the 1840’s when residents of six and
one-half townships petitioned the State Legislature to become
part of Greene County.
Mesopotamia (before 1818):Several homes
from old Mesopotamia remain along Highway 14, just Northwest of
Eutaw, including John Coleman’s Grassdale. Settled by Scots-Irish
Presbyterians, this became a community of planters with nearby churches, stores
and a stagecoach inn. This community was annexed to Eutaw in 1947.
Mt. Hebron (1818): Andrew Steele and
Josiah Collins were planters who left the coastal regions in
search of better land and who chose the Mt. Hebron area to begin,
again. The 1820 home of Dr. Arnold Jolly is adjacent to the
Parham house he used as an office. Captain Digges Poynor’s
1895 Mt. Hebron Academy stood nearby.
Pleasant Ridge (1819): In 1819, James H.
Archibald and David Hitt were the first settlers of Pleasant
Ridge. Union Academy was founded by sons of James in 1850, A. A.
& Edward A. Archibald.
The only Civil War skirmish in Greene County
was 1 mile North of Pleasant Ridge in late April 1865, when
troops of Nathan Bedford Forrest encountered a band of Union
Raiders.
Snoddy/Beulah: (1830’s): As a Rest
stop on the old stage line, Snoddy, later changed to Beulah, was
originally an area of small farms run by devout Christians in a
strict church community. The Beulah Academy existed from the
1850’s to the 1940’s. Beulah was part of Pickens County
in the 1840’s.
Springfield (1818): This was a town
of more than 1500 people in 1820 with big brick stores and two
hotels. It was a successful township of cotton planters and home
of the famous race horse, Daniel Boone. A cotton gin and a large
warehouse were also there in a site at the Warrior River known as
Meriweather’s Landing. Springfield is west of Merriweather's Landing about
3 miles north of Eutaw on U.S. 11.
Steele’s Bluff/Knoxville: The
community called Steele’s Bluff became known as Knoxville
after the Knox family came in the 1860’s. The Archibald,
McGiffert and Patton families were early settlers here.
Tishabee/Garrett’s Shop (1817):
Tishabee was a community West of Forkland, largely populated by
genteel intellectuals. As the first settler, Richard Bragg
developed the area on the Tombigbee River known as Bragg’s
Bluff. Grand homes once surrounded his in this area.
Union (about 1820's): Although
unincorporated until 1845, Union was settled as early as 1821. By
the 1850’s it was an active community of planters,
merchants, blacksmiths, physicians, teachers and saddle makers. A
cotton gin and press was operated by the M. A. Reynolds family
here well into the 1900’s. The Early 19th century
Jennings Stage Coach Inn, the Williamson-Reynolds House, and the
1836 Gordon Bamberger House are among its historic sites.
West Greene/ Hopewell (1824): This
community abandoned the name, Hopewell, following the War Between
the States. It is a cotton and cattle ranching region as well as
an archeological research site for Native American culture. Pioneers to this
area include Simeon and John Carpenter, Samuel Cherry, Joe Childers, Aquila
Coleman, J.D. Duncan, W.H. Foster, William Hales, J.D. Hutton and Jackson
Williams.
Sources:
Heritage Publishing Consultants, Inc., The Heritage of Greene County, Alabama,
(Clanton, Alabama: Walsworth Publishing Co., Inc., 2001), 4.
Owen, Thomas McAdory. History of Alabama and Dictionary of Alabama Biography. (Chicago: S.J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1921)
Snedecor, Gayle V., Snedecor's Directory of Greene County (1963 reprint, edited
by Franklin Shackelford Moseley, Eutaw, Alabama), page 65.
CITIES AND TOWNS IN GREENE COUNTY TODAY
Birdine
Boligee *
Braggvilleont
Caples
Clinton Eutaw *
Forkland *
Jena
Knoxville *
Lewiston *
Mantua *
Mount Hebron *
Pleasant Ridge *
Tishabee *
Union *
West Greene *
*Early Town still in existence today.
OTHER TOWNS & TOWNSHIPS OF YESTERDAY
THAT ARE NO LONGER
Boston, Dobbs, Drake's Landing, Frog Level, Glovers Ferry
Landing, Gradys Landing, Hairston, Hollow Square, Millwood, Red Gap, Waltons Landing
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